


An Eagle Amongst Wolves

by LovableKillerWhale



Category: Game of Thrones (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Game of Thrones Fusion, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Graphic Description of Corpses, One Shot, direwolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-05
Updated: 2019-07-05
Packaged: 2020-06-13 00:08:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19587691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LovableKillerWhale/pseuds/LovableKillerWhale
Summary: A dead direwolf south of the Wall is of great concern to House Barnes, but not everything about that discovery is worrisome. Even Stevyn Rogers doesn't walk away empty handed. Even if he isn't a Barnes himself.





	An Eagle Amongst Wolves

**Author's Note:**

> I read this one fic here on Ao3 that was a GoT/MCU fusion and I just had to give it a try myself! This is just a one-shot, but I do have some ideas for more, if anyone would be interested. If I'll get off my ass and write it, well, that's another question, oof.
> 
> Anyways, this fic follows one of the scenes in the first episode of GoT. Warning for not-so-graphic depiction of animal carcasses and mentions of violence, and some mild language. Other than that, everything should be fine.
> 
> Also a side note, I tried to make the names more GoT-like and it was actually quite fun to come up with these, haha.
> 
> Let me know what you think! <3

Following the beheading of the Night's Watch deserter, the Barnes convoy set on their way to return to the warmth of the stone walls of Winterfell. They rode along the road that cut through the Wolfswood, as it was the shortest way back to the castle.

Stevyn Rogers rode his black steed among the wolf-sigiled guardsmen of House Barnes, an eagle amongst the wolves. The golden eagle sigil of his house was still present on his furs next to the white direwolf of Barnes; Bucky insisted he keep it on, a silent reminder of Steve's true heritage.

Said James Barnes rode his chestnut mare beside him, the grey fur lining his shoulders bringing up his dark hair and eyes. Closely behind the pair was another outsider, one Borrock of House Rumlow, the blackened squid of his house alone on his breast with no wolf to accompany it. Brock stubbornly refused to wear anything Barnes-related that wasn't completely necessary in the North's cold climate. Steve never quite reached that level of unfamiliarity, but he knew Brock had his reasons to be reserved against House Barnes, given his history with them. 

Steve looked over his shoulder to steal a glance at Pyetro, to see how he was faring. The execution of the Night's Watch deserter was necessary, and Pyetro would have to grow up some day, but the light-haired boy was still so young. The absent expression on his youthful face concerned Steve. The sight of death was never easy, no matter what age.

With Lord Barnes riding up front, the whole convoy came to a sudden stop as the Lord's horse halted. 

There was something lying in the middle of the dirt path, bloody and mangled. An animal carcass, no doubt.

Steve was the first one to dismount his horse to come and investigate. He could hear Brock and Bucky follow suit behind him, as well as Lord Barnes himself.

Upon closer examination, the small blond realised that the carcass was that of a grown stag, its belly ripped and its guts spilled in the dust.

"It's a stag, my Lord," Steve called out to Lord Barnes. "Fresh, no doubt today. Maybe on the morn," he guessed.

"Thank you for your wisdom, Stevyn, never would have guessed that myself," Brock sneered as he crouched next to the dead deer, and grabbed ahold of its branching antlers. On one side, the sharp point of the antler was broken clean off, and red blood oozed down the horn onto the animal's face and into its dead, glassy eyes.

"Something got it good," Bucky joined in, taking in the sight. Steve hoped Pyetro stayed back with the horses and didn't have to look at the massacred body. The beheading of the deserter was enough spectacle for one day, especially for a boy of nine.

"A cougar?" Brock suggested, and wiped his bloody hands on the front of his leather jerkin. 

"There are no cougars in these parts, this far north," Lord Barnes declared at last, and scanned the surrounding woods. It was deadly quiet. Winter was coming, Steve had to remind himself, and the birds were scarce, but the forest was too silent for his liking. 

He noticed the blood trail leading into the underbrush at the same time as Bucky made his way to follow it deeper into the woods, off of the path that led to Winterfell. Brock was at Bucky's heels in an instant, and the two of them dove into the forest.

Steve moved to follow, but noticed Pyetro lingering near his bay pony, uncertain and lost without his father or brother. Steve sighed and approached the pale boy, forcing a gentle smile on his face.

"You don't have to come with us, you know. What we find might not be nice to look at. You can stay here and help guard the horses. What do you say?" Steve offered, but before he was even finished saying the sentence, the little boy shook his head vigorously.

"I want to come with," Pyetro declared, puffing out his tiny chest. The white fur around his shoulders shook with the movement. "I'm not a babe anymore, you know that."

"Alright," Steve agreed, finding himself unable to refuse his little adopted brother. "But stay close to us. Whatever killed that deer could still be prowling out there."

Pyetro just nodded, and with a determined look on his face, he walked alongside Steve, following the path of broken ferns and blood streaked across bushes, all the way to where Steve could make out the tall figures of Bucky and Brock.

They were silently looking at something laid across the ground. The distant sound of the nearby brook was accompanied by soft whines, barely audible amongst the hum of the Wolfswood.

Steve's eyes widened as he recognised the shape as the body of a giant wolf, almost half the size of a draft horse. Steve's hand that's been placed on his dirk in case something attacked relaxed as he noted that the wolf was just as lifeless as the stag. Buried in its side was the missing piece of the stag's crown, embedded in the beast's flesh like a knife.

And by the wolf's belly were four little lumps of fur, whining and whimpering into the fur of their dead mother. Two of the pups where various shades of brown and red, one was mottled grey, and the last one, clearly the biggest of the litter, was pure white.

The pups were dirty from the mud, undoubtedly hungry, and demanding food and warmth with loud pleas. 

When Bucky noticed Steve and Pyetro coming over, he reached down and grabbed the pup nearest to him - the grey one - and held it out by the scruff of its neck.

"Do you want to hold it?" he asked, and Pyetro wordlessly took it from Bucky and wrapped it in his skinny arms. Snuggled against his chest, the wolf pup quieted down.

"What in the seven hells is that? Is it what I think it is?" Steve asked, still taking in the sheer size of the wolf's outstretched body. It was longer than he was in height, and its glaring white teeth glistened in the light like daggers.

"A direwolf," Bucky confirmed his suspicions. "Never seen one before. They're not supposed to venture south of the Wall, or so I've been told. This may be the first one in thousands of years."

"And it's got pups, too," Steve pointed out, shifting his gaze to the squirming puppies at the wolf's teats. They couldn't have been older than a couple of weeks. A fortnight, maybe. Over their cries, Steve could hear the rest of the convoy approaching.

"Where will they go?" Pyetro asked as he petted the pup in his arms, "Their mother's dead."

"They'll starve without her," Lord Barnes said, when he, along with some of the guards, arrived at the wolf's carcass. He reached down and ripped the antler lodged in the wolf's body. The bloody part was almost an arm's long.

"The least we can do is to give them a quick death."

Steve heard the unmistakable sound of a blade being unsheathed, and in an instant, Brock was yanking the grey pup out of Pyetro's arms, ready to end the little wolf's life.

"No!" Pyetro cried at the same time as Bucky let out a silent warning. "Borrock," Bucky warned, using Brock's full name. His voice lower than usual, too. "Let it be."

"I follow your father's orders, not yours," Brock growled, and pressed the blade against the pup's trembling body.

"Lord Barnes, if I may," Steve spoke up, surprising even himself, "there are four pups. One for each of the Barnes children. The direwolf is the sigil of House Barnes. Perhaps… they were meant have them," he reasoned, and he could see the Lord's icy gaze soften.

"Very well." Lord Barnes said at last, and Brock lowered his knife. His sudden change in demeanor was nothing unheard of. Pyetro eagerly squeezed the pup back into his embrace, tighter than before.

"Now they're your responsibility," Lord Barnes clarified, as Bucky wasted no time in picking up the pups and handing one to Brock to carry. "You'll train them, feed them, and if they die, you'll bury them."

"Yes, father," Pyetro and Bucky echoed. 

"Would you look at that, two dogs and two bitches, perhaps our little Stevyn was right," Brock noted, and he wasn't wrong. Two for the boys and two for the girls. Steve pursed his lips, annoyed by Brock's constant taunts regarding his size and lineage. 

He swallowed a retort, and instead, his attention snapped to Bucky, and he couldn't help but smile. Bucky holding a squirming pup at each breast was a sight Steve would remember for a long time.

His amusement quickly seeped out again when Pyetro asked, "What about Steve?"

There it was. The always present nagging that he wasn't one of them, that he didn't belong in the pack. Before he could repeat his mantra, Brock beat him to it.

"He's not a Barnes," Brock shrugged, and that was the end of the conversation. He didn't miss Brock's satisfied grin when he turned away from him. The convoy moved out to return back to their horses, until Steve was the last one beside the wolf's corpse.

He sighed, ready to follow suit, when he heard something. The faintest whine, just a whisper in the wind. Maybe he imagined it, but he turned back nonetheless.

There it was again, a soft whimper, much weaker than that of the four direwolf pups that the Barnes took with them. 

Steve crouched and examined the corpse, and there - a whisp of fur much lighter than the dark grey of the mother - Steve flipped over the direwolf's tail, and tangled between its hind legs was a fifth pup.

It was pale silver, almost white, and its eyes weren't even opened properly. It was also much smaller than the other pups, maybe half a size of the white pup, the biggest of the litter.

Feeling a rush of kinship between himself and the tiny outcast pup, Steve picked it up by the scruff of its neck and and held it against his chest. It blinked its eyes up at him, and he could see they were pale blue and piercing right into his soul, similar to his.

Steve snapped his head up at the sound of laughter.

"Today is full of coincidences, is it not?" Brock snickered, his hands full with one of the brown pups, "A runt of the litter for the runt of the litter. That one's yours, Rogers."

Shaking his head, Brock turned around and stalked after the others. Bucky had a wide, dumb smile, however, clearly enlightened that Steve had found a pup of his own.

"Don't listen to Rumlow, Steve" Bucky told him for the millionth time when he passed him, a fond smile still residing on his angular face. "He's just jealous because you're a part of the family in a way he won't ever be."

Steve just nodded absent mindedly, stroking his silver pup's fur as he mounted into the saddle of his horse. He pondered Bucky's words.

Borrock Rumlow had been forced into being the Barnes' squire after his father's rebellion against king Howard Stark, a longtime friend of George Barnes, the Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North. He was a bitter lad that only ever had a good mood around Bucky, because the two of them had both been seventeen of age, while Steve and the other Barnes children were lagging behind and therefore none of Brock's interest.

Despite the cruel jeers and swinging mood, Steve found himself pitying the boy. It was no wonder he was so jealous of Steve when the Barneses had welcomed Steve with open arms. Well, maybe except for Lady Winnifred, because she only had eyes for her own children. 

Ever since his mother had died, and that was during a winter almost ten years ago, the Barneses had looked after him.

Afterall, Houses Barnes and Rogers had been close allies for thousands of years, and with Steve being the last of his House, sixteen of age and scrawny and sickly, Lord Barnes took it upon himself to take care of the child of his good friend, Joseph Rogers. Steve's father had died before he was born, killed in Howard Stark's rebellion.

So Brock was right, Steve was a Rogers through and through, with no Barnes or wolf in him at all. All of House Barnes was dark-haired, or red-haired, with strong statures and brown eyes and sharp northern features, and in comparison Steve looked pathetic. Small and skinny, sickly, with honey-coloured hair and pale blue eyes and a an almost eagle-like nose that Brock made fun of because it resembled the Rogers' House sigil.

All of Brock's words stung much more because Steve knew they were true. 

But now, with the silver, blue-eyed direwolf pup snuggled in his arms, he could pretend he was a Barnes for a little bit longer.

As the imposing silhouette of Winterfell came into view, Steve smiled, already thinking about Nat and Wanda's reactions when they'd present them with the direwolf pups.

House Barnes maybe wasn't his born family, but Bucky, Pyetro, Nat and Wanda were his siblings all the same. 

Steve was an eagle among wolves, but the wolves weren't out to hunt him. 

No, the wolves let him among their ranks, inside their pack, as one of them.

Steve was a part of House Barnes no matter how much he couldn't believe it.

**Author's Note:**

> In case anyone is wondering, Steve is the summerest summer's child that's ever summered.
> 
> Bucky was born in winter though.


End file.
